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Friday, June 25, 2010

(old) Pinned post for prospective faculty to IITs/IISc

This is a pinned post (i.e., this post will always appear at the top of this blog though newer posts appear below it) for prospective faculty to IITs/IISc. Please post all your questions and comments here and please read this site before you post your queries.

221 comments:

I had applied to IIT Madras in January for AP against an advertisement which has a deadline of Feb. 15 2010. It is mentioned in the IITM homepage, shortlisted candidates will be informed by MArch 15, 2010. Does anyone receive any inetrview call??

I applied to IITD for AP around July last year and I know I was shortlisted therefater. I haven't heard anything from them yet. The last I heard from them was around November saying the process is ongoing. Emails go unanswered as usual. Does anyone have any knowledge about whether interviews have already taken place at IITD or when they are having the interview?

Would any of the readers know around when shortlisting/interviews take place for Assistant Professor positions in IIT Bombay? How are the candidates usually notified (email/phone call/letter?)? Thanks in advance.

I applied for an AP position at IIT Gn and got an interview call. They seem to operate quite efficiently in terms of their communication with the applicants. Unfortunately, I could not attend the interview (even on skype) on the time and date they mentioned (I am currently not in India and had a very important meeting that I could not postpone it). The administration told me that they will consider me for an interview in the next cycle of selections.

Has anyone applied to IIT Gn for an AP position? Please post here if you have applied and heard anything since your application.

Why don't applicants ask some faculty member in the department other than HOD about the status. If some1 is applying for an AP post then she should have participated in conferences/published in journals and must/should be having some contact with other faculties.

I understand that, in the ME dept of IIT Gn, the interviews were held on the 6th and 7th of April. It would be very helpful to me and others if someone who has gone through the process write their experience.

Anon @11:34 says "In IITs, only professors make the decision but the HOD is the final authority. Even though we have contacts with APs, they are helpless and can not help" - AP's cant even find out status? About the other point, I am an HoD, just conducted interviews a couple of weeks ago, but I think somebody forgot to tell the selection committee that I am the final authority. Of course, HoD can influence the selection committee, but the Director is a bigger influence and the final decision really hinges on the 'external' selection committee members. In this case, the external members were two directors from CSIR and a former HoD from IISc - I dont think it would be that easy for an IIT HoD to unduly influence such a panel.

Dear iitmriram,thanks for your insights into the hiring process in iit's. I was surprised to find out that the external committee can overrule the departmental recommendation. I dont know of any other university abroad or even other educational institutions in India where the departmental view on candidate selection is not followed. This puts an enormous amount of power in the hands of the external committee most of whom probably know very little about the department in which hiring is occurring and opens up the possibility of abuse of such power. I know that a counter argument is that the external committee is there to prevent things like inbreeding but if you look at some departments in for instance IITD, it becomes clear that the external committee have not prevented inbreeding from occurring. In any case, your and anyone else's views on this will be appreciated. SS

The original post has a link to the faculty recruitment and promotion process where I have provided more details. The external members are not random people, they are drawn from a list submitted by the department; the visitor's nominee (only for Professor level recruitments) is not under this, and so it does happen sometimes that some random person unfamiliar with the department and field (but well connected in New Delhi) sits there. I did not mean to suggest that the panels ignore the HoD, just that the panel does overrule the department recommendations sometimes (10-15% of the time, maybe, and both ways - department yes and no both have gotten overruled). In this case, the two CSIR directors were not alien, one is an alumnus of the department and the other is an IIT faculty member on lien. But it is true that the external members of the selection committee wield enormous power.

I meant that HOD is the final authority within the department. I contacted my friend, who is an AP, to check with the HOD regarding the status. He was told, "Ask the candidate to check with me." When I emailed, there is no response. Maybe I should call. But even a reply or acknowledgment saying that please call would be nice.

I was just reading the comments by the HOD. If I have to belive in his statements about the quality of recruitment, India must be scientific power by this time. Each dept. in IIT take people which they like not based on merit. Only 20% may come through proper way. If you look at the Asst. Prof. CV in many IITs, one can find big difference and there is no base line. Even one can see Asst. prof. without good publiactiona and psotdoc.

The only solution to this is to outsource IIT faculty recruitment to top class forign universities which is followed by many institutes in the developing world.

This post is supposed to be only for the prospective faculties who seek informations about their application status and on related issues. However, it seems to be again converting to a war-field where allegations are being made related to the selection process.Dear abusers, please stop this and let the discussion continue on the 'real' issue.

I think it is a good practice to have a selection committee with external members so as to keep the process of hiring fair and square. It is not unheard of that the department in some cases due to politics may try to push a candidate with lower credentials. This happens in some cases in the US also. I think and IITMSRIRAM may clarify that selection committee normally goes with persons the dept. is interested in. This makes sense as the person hired has to work within the said dept.I have one question for Sriram. In US we do not have any external members or any selection committee. The department votes and if it sits well with the Dean the hire is made. Is the rationale behind having selection comm. in India just to keep a check on possible corrupt hiring practices or is there something else.

I got the offer from an IIT for AP position. The offer letter says that the appointment will be on contract basis. I don't have 3 years of post-PhD experience and it is probably due to this.Has anyone else also got the offer stating that it is on contract basis?

Congrats on the IIT-AP offer! I am waiting for IIT-Gn to schedule their next interview process since I missed the previous one they asked me to attend on SKYPE. Can you please share your interview experience with the group so that we can be better prepared for the task. I understand that they may be quite independent of each other but there may be some common traits among different IIT's. Thanks in advance.

K:For AP positions, usually they ask mostly technical questions and that too from the undergrad syllabus. But again it depends on the selection committee members and they can ask anything. Be prepared with your future research interests as well.

The interview committee (external members, HOD, Director etc) also asks questions like how you would explain concept X to 1'st year undergraduates. I have also heard friends tell me that they often ask patronizingly (in my view) whether the candidate can handle a large class of 100 or so very smart and competitive undergraduates. Such inane questions are pointless. What do they expect the candidate to say - that he/she cannot handle such a class. Besides its also insulting to the candidates. I have never heard of any prospective faculty go through such kinds of interviews in any university abroad. I dont know how much weightage is given to candidates answers in such interviews. Can a candidate with a good research record and references be eliminated on the basis of not being able to answer a question or two in such interviews ? Incidentally, the external committee members are usually not present during the candidates research seminar (typically held the day before the interview.) I think the interview committees in IIT's need to grow up and stop treating faculty candidates in the same way they would treat PhD students. I know all interview committees are not the same, but I have heard about incidents like the ones mentioned above several times. So they are unlikely to be outlier events.

Dear Prospective Faculty,As someone mentioned, the committee may ask if you can handle 100+ purportedly smart kids. There are 100+ students in old IITs but may be at best 10% smart. And you don't have to be exceptional to handle any number of students as long as you do not make any mistakes in your class. Just keep it simple, clear and be confident when you stand-up there and you will enjoy teaching. The only issue I find as a new faculty is, 100 students is a lot to make eye-to-eye contact, which in comparison to smaller class sizes (PG classes), doesn't offer the kind of interaction/discussion you may want to have in the class. With regards to selection committee depending on how strongly your dept. had recommended your application, you may face very simple questions or some probing questions. Personally, I find "so called" experts asking UG syllabus questions not so good. Of all the IIXs I have applied to and interviewed with, the experience I had can be rated as IISc>IITB>IITM>IITD.

To SA, Apparently, IIT's only have one day an year for a particular department in a particular IIT to conduct interviews (I was told by a senior official at an IIT). If you miss it for any reason, then you will have to wait for one complete year to do it the next time. However, they apparently have interviews once in 3 months or so but they can only offer a contract position during those interviews, and the candidate will be presented to the BIG committee whenever it meets the next time. Please, anyone correct me if anything I have said is not correct. In fact, I would appreciate that very much.

In summary, you must hear from them sometime before the interview date if you are selected for one.

I am currently a postdoctoral fellow ( 1yr) in organic chemistry at a good university in USA. I also earned my Ph.D here in US. Recently I got a job offer for a Scientist position in a pharmaceutical company in B'lore area. I don't know whats the salary I can expect for this position. Please let me know if you have any idea. Thanks for your help

@R : "I have an offer from IIT Kharagpur. I want to know how are facilities in and out of the IIT campus like, school for kids, hospitals, shopping mall, etc."

First of all CONGRATS! The facility is as good as or better than what is expected in a satellite city with a big railway establishment, three units of Tata (Tata Bearings, Tata Metaliks, TELCON) and many other industries, two army units (Salua, Kalaikunda) and its fast improving. The greatest part is that the campus retains its natural beauty, pollution free atmosphere which is absent in Metros. The district headquarter Midnapore is 15 km away with a medical college and many other facilities. Kolkata City/Airport is now 2.5 hours drive (140-150 km) with refurbished NH6 improving connectivity. There is daily morning and evening volvo bus service from IIT campus gate to Kolkata that takes approx. 3 hours and great for a day long fun trip to Kolkata. Puri is just an overnight journey (8 hours) and great for a weekend trip. Other beaches that are nearer are - Digha, Shankarpir, Chandipur etc. Inside campus, Technology Club is vibrant with many different activities from cricket match (IITKGP faculty vs. J.U. faculty vs. Railway Officers Club - triangualr, quadrangular tournament and so on) to Saraswati Puja. The in house movie hall brings latest block-busters every week with three shows reserved for faculty and staff and rest for the students. There are plenty of direct trains towards Kolkata and to south(Chennai Bangalore, Hyderabad etc), west (Mumbai, Ahmedabad etc. north (Delhi and others - Rajdhani, Neelachal etc.)Inside campus, there are four schools (KV, DAV etc.). Restaurants are plenty, the recent addition "Heritage" has two 'faculty only' and 'family only' lounge. Big Bazaar is there for sometime and Reliance etc. are coming up. A new AIIMS like hospital in Kharagpur itself (in addition to other hospitals like state general, rail etc.) got clearance from Health Ministry and State Govt. What else? A new fly-over to debottleneck two railway crossing at IITKGP entrance is coming up fast (almost all the pillars are in place, overhead work to begin). Anything missing? You have not asked let me share. This IIT may have one of the best teacher-student relation. Besides academic interaction they work together in many socially relevant projects through National Service Scheme and various other NGOs. It is great fun to participate in that, too. Looking forward to have you amongst us and work together.

Dear GS,Thank you very much for your detailed response. I too look forward to work with you in near future.Could you please also tell something about the faculty quarters. I mean, how good they are and what type of quarter I can expect when I join as an AP. I have asked this to the concerned Asst. Registrar also but no reply till yet.Thank you again. I think this detailed description is very useful for the prospective faculties and it should be put on the IITKgp webpage as well.R.

@P:Congrats for your offer from IITK. I am also expecting an interview call from there. May I know when was your interview for this position?I have not heard anything from there till yet and this probably indicates that I was not shortlisted for the interview. Please respond so that it could become clear.SA.

@R: GS's comments are tricky. No offense there. While most of it is true, it is highly selective. Campus is green- Definitely, but beware of all kind of snakes except during the monsoon period. To be fair, I have not heard any case of snake bite though. AIIMS like hospital - with the pace at which things progress in Kgp, you can expect it in the next ten years. BigBazaar, Reliance - Well that's not where you are going to stay, are you?Public transport - practically none. You get share autos which stack up atleast 10 people. Own a vehicle or book a taxi any time you have to go out. Job Opportunities for your spouse in town: -NIL-

KGP has probably the worst faculty quarters among IITs. Leaking roofs, theft-even light bulbs and clothes get stolen.. You have to wait at least another 10 years to get a decent accommondation. What's more, there is no option to rent outside - power cuts for 8hrs a day.

+ves: Good academic atmosphere, student-faculty relationship, research support, in a month or two you will forger other issues.

@R, @MSIITKGP Accommodation : Since it is all about perception, let me present data collected this morning from Estate office. We have here three distinct type of quarters. One is multistoried flats. Next is duplex with reasonable space for garden. The other is bungalows with large garden space. On arrival, one is given a 2 Room transit flat, with new whitewash and maintenance work done (you can point out more if you come across and get it done) with LAN, internet, telephone connection, 24 hour water and power supply with electrical fittings and provision for A.C. connection in one room (if it is not there, you ask and will be done in 1-2 week(s)). In fact, all acco. have these common facilities. One may even be surprised to get an offer for a bungalow!!! The present trend here is to opt for flats while it was bungalows sometime back. To me it is more difficult to maintain a bungalow (I didn't opt) as less and less people have time and energy to take care of a large garden etc. But there are takers too.

The acco. provided is on seniority basis. A better maintained acco. (by previous owner) will go to somebody more senior. I have seen many a newcomer opting for bungalow and doing small renovation work themselves as per their choice. IIT estate office may do the same immediately if it is not a volume job else it may take few months.

Since 2009 beginning, a massive renovation exercise of campus bungalows have started with older quarters are refurbished with new roof work, modern floor (tiles), kitchen (stone), toilet etc. A large no. of quarters is already renovated in last one year. Work for the rest is going on. In addition to this, 63 new flats will be ready in June 2010, another 63 in Dec. 2010, another 18 in June 2011. These are larger flats with 4-5 rooms, 2-3 toilets called A or B Type. If seniors take them, relatively better flats where seniors are at present become available to juniors. in last few years, 68 such big A/B flats have been handed over. Relatively older but in a very good condition B Type flats are 81 in no.s. Besides these there are 54 no. 2BR flats are there which have many takers. There is no reason to force anybody stay outside and there is no single example.

Does it take 10 years? : Let me give my example. I joined here in 2002 July. I was offered on arrival 2-3 bungalows and few 2 room flats to opt from. For one year I stayed in G-Floor of a 2 room flat, for two and half year in 1st floor of a 2 room flat and after total 3.5 years (Jan., 2006) moved to present 3 Bedroom, separate drawing and dining, one study, three toilet, 2 balcony G-Floor B-Type flat. Institute did a thorough maintenance before we moved in with completely new flooring etc. It took some time but we stayed in our previous flat till the repair work was over. We have a small garden too to take advantage of G-Floor.

There are quite a few duplex (which was preferred by seniors sometime back at the level of Deans) which may not be available on arrival but some of my colleagues got it after 3-4 years.

In short, institute understands the need and is trying its best to make stay of a faculty member enjoyable in a proactive way. Any member of the family can fill up an online complaint even from home (as stated all quarters are on LAN, internet) at any hour of the day, it is addressed in 0-2 days (even if you are out of station on some official duty). For large repair one has to have some patience as it takes time to mobilize the resources.

Few units have damps. Avoid them. Institute is either repairing or demolishing them.

With 550 faculty members and the pace with which new flats are coming up a new faculty will have less waiting period than our batch. Estate office people says that will be a large surplus after Dec. 2010 since the pace faculty addition is less.GS

Exceeds 4096 characters: For more visithttp://gskgp.blogspot.com/2010/04/in-campus-with-love.html

Hello all,This comment/question will probably ignite some kind of wrath towards me from IIT-KGP-ians or will start a healthy debate on the aspect of regionalism in our IIT's.

Recently, there was a post in another blog (R2I as Professor) where a new AP (originally from south) expressed frustration regarding the use of Bengali during official and academic related meetings in IIT-KGP. Even after requesting the senior faculty to conduct the meeting in English, he, apparently, was asked to learn Bengali if he wishes to survie.

Now, the credibility of the above person can be debated; but we all can give the benefit of doubt to him given ones tendency to use his/her respective mother tongue when he/she meets his/her native speaking fellows. I would like to hear more comments from people who might have experienced this first hand. I am not just concentrating on IIT-KGP, but in general, the tendency to conduct official business in a local language, when some of the members attending the meeting lack the knowledge of that particular language.

Professor Madras, your comments on this issue will be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

@K - Allow me to add more of such complaints about IITKGP. - The tower is too tall. It obstructs my view when I look up and I fail to assimilate as much energy as I should have got in another place in my favourite mudra.- There is a solitary cell near old tower where freedom fighters were kept. I want freedom. I want fight. But IITKGP authority says that it is a museum and doesn't allow me to stay there.- I cannot speak Hindi. Tried English with a local shopkeeper. He understood only half. Even tried German (I am a Humboldt fellow. Just returned and now has great command over it. Before going I learnt keywords/sentences in German)! The poor fellow does not know even that!

SD:I graduated from Kanpur and can tell you everything about what you want to know. However, I too had applied there but haven't heard anything till yet. First let me know when was your interview in Kanpur and then I shall answer your question about Knapur.SD: and P: - Please respond!B.

@Anon at 2:28 p.m. : I thought Anon on 30.4.2010 at 5:43 p.m. made it sound sufficiently trivial!

It is too wild an allegation to respond. I never faced it, heard it and don't believe it to be true. The character of an institution is different from an individual. IIT as an institution has nothing to do with regionalism and there are enough checks and balances within the system. We deal with young students coming from different parts of the country. The faculty members are also from many different states. It is mini-India out here in the campus. We are proud of its cosmopolitan culture.

@gs, One of the reasons I posted the comment on the existence of regionalism is to verify the occurrence/authenticity of such claims from multiple sources that are placed within the institutes. I must say that I very relieved to hear that such instances, if and when they occur, are almost rare when compared to the overall structure of the institute.

You see, prospective faculty like me have so many questions regarding everything related to the institute; ranging from teaching and research to general life in and around the campus. Even though life will be much easier if one only concentrates on the positive things, it is very easy to get distracted by one such negative post by someone who is already working at an institute.

Finally, as I already mentioned in my post, all I was looking for is information from different inside people. Moreover, I was not specifying that it happens (or not) in IIT-KGP, but instead exploring such incidents in all educational institutes in India.

@GS:If you see the faculty structure in your Dept. at IITKgp, there are a total of 32 faculty members at present and only 4 of them are non-Bengali. Still you claim that it is mini-India. Going by this number, don't you think that the institute is biased towards the Bengali people at the level of hiring.

Thanks K for finding info. useful. You are most welcome to raise any issue that bugs you. Yours truly will try to respond to the best of his capacity. Everywhere you'll find some people finding fault with almost anything! Don't read too much into that. IITs provide best of the opportunities - funded research, industry collaboration, international alliance, enthusiastic & quality students, prestige, decent salary-honorarium for many things-royalty from patents, book etc. Great to be born in an era when India as a nation is looking up, making itself count, finding a place for itself in the comity of nations! Great to be in a place like this playing an important catalytic role in the process!

@Anon at 5:57 p.m. - Your stat. is incorrect. So is the conclusion drawn. Kindly check with other Dept.s too. Getting a faculty at IIT had been difficult. We have >250 vacancies. A strong reason for a person to opt for a position here has been - to stay close to home, to remain connected to the root. I wonder if that is something for which (s)he can be blamed or Dept./Inst. can be faulted with! At least we got people to shoulder the responsibility because of that emotional attachment! There is no single case where application from a deserving candidate has been turned down. The fact is that we get more applications from people of this region - most from Bengal, then Orissa etc. The same is true for any organization in any region. I think the host here has discussed at length how faculty selection takes place at IIT and who are the selection committee members etc. Also this is an age of RTI with documents available for every application - scores etc. Finally, IITs are too big, self esteem of people here too high - to stoop to so low!

Continuing on GS's comments, it is very natural for IITs to have more of faculty from that specific region. Take four well deserving candidates one from south, one from east, one from west and one from north. Now say they are all interviewed in IIT-M,kgp,D and B respectively. Now since they are good, say all of them get offers from all four IITs. what will be the natural inclination. Person from east will choose IIT-kgp, person from south will choose IIT-M, person from north maybe IIT-D and person from west IIT-B. this is the probable scenario. Now things like two body problems can creep in. since kgp is located in the middle of nowhere some people might choose delhi or bombay over kgp. but bottomline is the region bias of the candidates automatically makes the IITs look as if they are hiring only people from a certain zone. In reality it is the candidates who are deciding which ones to join.

@gs, I understand your point of view and I can also see how things might have played out in terms of the faculty numbers in different IIT's.

If I may, I would like to ask one more question, the answer to which I have not found in any of the forums despite my constant searching.

How do you see the new IIT's playing the role of premier institutes of higher education in India. In terms of faculty, students, infrastructure, research, teaching, funding and X-factors (if any). I understand that the answer to this question can be very subjective, at least in some aspects and quite objective in some. But overall, can you please pour your thoughts on this matter.

@K on "How do you see the new IIT's playing the role of premier institutes of higher education in India...."

I think you will get better input from a more qualified person who envisioned these new IITs. Prof. Barua IITG Director often visits this blog. He may give better picture.

My humble observations are : A new IIT has to go through same phases of a development cycle as found in any other IIT. I have visited IITKGP museum and saw how things shaped up brick by brick, the condition in which faculty members stayed in initial years. Remember, at that time there were other established engineering colleges. It was a great sacrifice for these people who gave their shoulder to start the wheel. In the first convocation (1956), Prime Minister Pt. Nehru recognizing this effort said ""Here in the place of that Hijli Detention Camp stands the fine monument of India, representing India's urges,India's future in the making. this picture seems to me symbolical of the changes that are coming to India."

The changes have come. India as nation now is stronger than ever. Today the development cycle time for a new IIT will be much less. Each of them is headed by great personalities with lots of acad. & admin. experience. MHRD is extending full support. It is a pride of the respective state & the state Govt. is doing its best. The faculty members joining there, I believe, share the same dream and building their institute with their toil, owning up a challenge greater than their counterpart in an established IIT. As a nation, we are indebted to each of these teams.

Faculty : Top positions - Dir., Dept. Head are filled up by experienced people with proven acad & admin record. I know a few good PhD students from IITKGP joining there.

Students : That higher ranked IITJEE student will chose an established IIT is a part of the development cycle phase. Need not be surprised at that. But the students joining there are also good. I interacted with lot of IIT Bhubaneswar students when they were here in 1st year. I didn't find any difference.

Infrastructure : These days it does not take much time.

Research : Experienced people placed at top will extend full support.

Teaching : No different from another IIT.

Funding : Govt. funding is very much there. It is not that difficult to get. You have to write a good proposal and defend it. There is no dearth of funds. It may take some time to get industry fund. But the newer IITs with smarter decision making process (agility because of small size) must be trying innovative measures to develop partnership with industries.

X-factor : X-factor cannot be told, it has to be felt :-)

Boarders from newer IITs can share their experience. To me every challenge is interesting in some way or the other. It always leaves one enriched if faced fair and square.

@gs, Thank you very much for your response. I have been grappling with the thoughts of whether to join an existing IIT or a new one, in case I get offers from both. Again, just in case.

I agree with you on several of those aspects. Especially, regarding students, given that JEE ranking can shift by hundreds just by a change in one score point, I would assume that students joining new IIT's are as good (may be not necessarily better) as the ones joining the old ones.

Also, regarding infrastructure, I guess given the pace with which the modernization of India (at least urban India) is taking place I expect the new IIT's with their own buildings in a few years time.

I personally spoke to the director of one of the IIT's and felt very inspired by what he had to say about the opportunities that one would get in terms of setting up labs and making a difference to the research and teaching community from a new perspective.

If you have the option then joining an old IIT makes much sense. The new IITs can have buildings and facilties in the time span of several years which is commendable but you as a researcher will suffer during this phase. some 7-8 years of valuable time will be lost. So if research is your priority then do not join the new IITs as of now.

This is simply because more number of Bengalis go to higher studies than the people from any other states. Bengalis, in general, are also more inclined towards teaching and research after pursuing higher studies.

I like the spirit of regionalism-anon. You are great dude! We need more of you in this country to propose a region based quota system - more so for the well run, well managed institutes like IIT, IISc, ISRO etc. which catches eyeballs. Let us not allow them more than 100/30 = 3.33 percent of staff from any particular state and union territories put together.

I got an offer from one of the newer IITs and I have a month to decide. But I am expecting interview calls from 2 more around June-July. Ideally I would like to know the result of the other 2 which will help me to make an informed decision. Can I get an extension till July to decide if I request it? Has anyone faced similar problems? Any response will be appreciated.

GS: Thank you so much for your inputs on IIT-KGP. They are most useful.

M: It is always better to tell the reality. Inform the new IIT that you may get offers from old IITs and that you will make a decision within 4 months. Therefore, ask them for a 4 month extension. Atleast in branches like chemical engineering, the selection committee members are the same in several IITs. So they will come to know anyway. Better to be forthright.

Prof. Giri:You said: 'Atleast in branches like chemical engineering, the selection committee members are the same in several IITs. So they will come to know anyway.'In M's case, he/she has to inform the corresponding Dept. (not the selection committee members) about the extension. So how come will the selection committee members (from other IITs) will get to know about it? It should be quite normal to appear in interviews at multiple places as no one could be sure beforehand.

I think you misunderstood what I meant. Say M has been offered in IIT-H and he accepts the offer, though he thinks he will accept the offer if he is offered by IIT-M and K. Now, IIT-H is mentored by IIT-M and there are several common faculty and, therefore, IIT-M will naturally come to know.

Further, when he appears for selection for IIT-M and K, he will encounter a selection comm. member who has already interviewed him in IIT-H and given him the offer. Therefore, the question will then come up as to which offer he will accept and whether he has already accepted the offer from IIT-H etc.

If he is forthright, he can say that he has got an offer from IIT-H, he has asked them for 4 months time and when he gets the offer from IIT-M and K, he will make a final decision.

This is NORMAL. IISc and IITs expect that a good candidate will get multiple offers and it is the choice of candidate where he/she will join. Many times this is based on the region where the candidate comes from, job opportunities for spouse etc. Thus, a predominance of south indians in IIT-M/IISc is not due to the choice of the IIT but due to the choice of the candidate.

@ Anon (May 5, 2010 6:11 PM), Thank you for your suggestion. My reserch area is mostly applied mathematics focused towards industrial applications. So, it is mostly pen, paper and a computer. However, as you mentioned it will probably be several years before the infrastructure to support research activities is built, and that is certainly a set back.

I would appreciate any comments from people (existing faculty or going to be) from new IIT's throw some light on this matter.

Hi,Can someone share this ebook or link 'The Effective, Efficient Professor: Teaching Scholarship and Service', if available freely.I found title of this book from one of the prevoius post.Thanks in advance

@anon(on faculty quota): From what I know, there is no quota on scales from Grade Pay of Rs. 7,600/- in central government. Which means there is no reservation quota (or, to be politically correct, there is indeed reservation with the percentage being '0') from the level of Asst. Prof.(Grade Pay Rs 8000/-) in IITs. On paper IITs/IISc/IISER are 4 tier institutions, also having the position of Lecturer below Asst. Prof., but never filled up. Gurus correct me.

One thing that surprises me is that very few people posted that they had gone through the interview process at IIT's. Given that IIT-Hyd had 1700 and IIT-Gn had 700 (source TOI) applications for AP positions, I expected that more people will be interviewed to start this coming August. However, we do not see such thing happening, at least by following this blog. Of course, I am assuming that at least some people who had gone through the interview process will either share their experience here or at the very least just report it.

Thanks to Dr. Madras, we have a detailed account of the interview process and its time-line in IISc. However, the interview process at IIT's seems to be bit more undefined in terms of when the applicant can expect to hear back after the initial application. Can any IIT professors please correct me if I am wrong. @gs, may be you can pitch-in your share of thoughts on this.

well, I have 6 years of pre-PhD experience and 1 year of post PhD experience. I have got an offer of Assistant Professor at a new IIT at a basic of 30000 + 8000 AGP. I have been called for the interview for Associate Professor at one of the premier NIT.. please suggest me what should I do. I am not clear about:1. 3 Lacs for 03 years as paid in IIT.. whether NIT have any such scheme..2.career advancemant in NITs..

well, I have 6 years of pre-PhD experience and 1 year of post PhD experience. I have got an offer of Assistant Professor at a new IIT at a basic of 30000 + 8000 AGP.I have been called for the interview for Associate Professor at one of the premier NIT..please suggest me what should I do. I am not clear about:1. 3 Lacs for 03 years as paid in IIT.. whether NIT have any such scheme..2.career advancemant in NITs..

To RameshM, As SB mentioned, joining an IIT vs NIT is mostly your preference of research environment and the type of students, infrastructure and funds you might get. I understand that starting at a new IIT can be apprehensive given that almost all of them do not even have their own buildings. However, you the budget, as I know, allocated to build the new IIT's is about 2300 crores, which is a huge sum of money.

Even if you join an NIT now, and if you do not like it there, you can always look for positions in IIT's later given the shortage of faculty in India.

Thanks SB & K But what I feel, IIT faculties have been given a raw deal, although they protested for a long before accepting 6th PC. To get promoted to Associate Professor at IIT may take 8 to 10 years for a fresh PhD, while one may get promoted to Associate in NITs in 5 years..I do n't find any logic behind this...

As per MHRD notification:"Associate Professor: For appointment as Associate Professor, one should have a Ph.D with first class or equivalent at the preceding degree in the appropriate branch with a very good academic record throughout and a minimum of six years teaching / research / industrial experience of which at least three years should be at the level of Assistant Professors, Senior Scientific Officer/Senior Design Engineer."

My qeries regarding this:1. Scientific officers are at the level of senior lecturer (10,000-325-15200,Old.. New: basic 18,600 +AGP 7000). They need not be PhD, but MTech is enough. Now a faculty with 03 years of Pre-PhD teaching experience as Senior Lecturer and then 03 years post PhD Assistant Professor: are they not eligible for Associate professor..

2. Assistant Professor: For appointment as Assistant Professor, one should have a Ph.D with first class or equivalent at the preceding degree in the appropriate branch with a very good academic record throughout and at least three years' teaching / research / industrial experience, excluding however, the experience gained while pursuing Ph.D.

:: where it is written that for assistant professor post- PhD exoerience is only valid.A scientist in ISRO or reseach engineer with MTech for 03 years and with recent PhD are not they eligible for Assistant professor direct. 30000+8K.

The minimum eligibility to be promoted to Associate Professor in NIT is 5 years experience while it is 6 years experience at IIT. However, the two are not equivalent posts - the NIT post has minimum pay of 37400 + 9000 grade pay while the IIT post has minimum pay of 42800 + 9500 grade pay (grade pay is supposed to indicate the stature of the post). At the Professor level also, the NIT post has no fixed minimum pay but a grade pay of 10000 while the IIT post has minimum 48000 + 10500 grade pay. At the 'super prof' level, both have same grade pay of 12000 with minimum pay of 48000 at NIT and no fixed minimum at IIT.

2. Yes, eligible. However, a fresh PhD with 3 years pre-phd experience may not meet the publication norms (that are not in the advertisement); there is usually a requirement of x number of Journal publications in the last 3-4 years (x depends on IIT and department); for example, in my department (IITM Aero) x is 3. Applicants not meeting this norm will not be offered 30K+8K even though they have sufficient experience.

One needs 6 years of experience as assistant prof to be eligible for associate prof position.

Do the 3 years as assistant prof on contract contribute to these 6 years of experience? Or does one need 6 years of experience as full-assistant prof, ie effectively 9 years from joining as fresh phd, to reach assoc prof level?

Do the IITs have a position designated as "Visiting Assistant Professor"? I could see in the advertisements that there are two types of AP: 1) OCAP (those who doesn't have 3yrs postdoc exp) and 2) Regular AP.

Is the Visiting AP (VAP) is someone who has not yet defended the thesis ?

Visiting AP is a temporary position offered by the department to faculty who have not yet appeared before a selection committee. For example, the department wants to offer a candidate who is keen to come back in May itself. The advertisement may appear in July, say. Then, IIT will offer a visiting AP and then he will apply in July, appear before a selection committee and then become "permanent"

It is understandable if a good candidate who is keen to come back from abroad is recruited as Visiting AP.

If a department recruits a candidate, who is already in India and moreover he/she was a PhD student of a top administrator (or of his colleague) of the institute, as a visiting AP, then how can we say that the selection was unbiased? (even if the candidate is exceptionally bright)

I have an offer from ome of the IIT-M for Ast Prof position. I have to tell them when should i join. However, I am doing postdoc in USA and I like to stay another 8 months. Is there any example that people were given this time before they joined in IIT-M or other IITs. Thanks for your reply.

I have given similar time between my offer letter and joining date. However, in my case I have strong family (my wife's work and children's school) and work (I had several reports and papers due) reasons.

If it was not for these reasons I would have preferred to join IISc earlier.

Varaparasad has already responded - it is only 6 years total experience of which at least 3 should be at the level of assistant professor; since it only says "level of", assistant professor on contract, visiting assistant professor and also non-teaching designations like senior scientific officer all count. What about visiting assistant professor position? Visiting assistant professor (or any other visiting faculty designation) is a purely temporary position with some significant restrictions - cannot apply for projects, cannot be guide for ms or phd students and may not be eligible for several other benefits (like retirement, seniority etc) - so, it is not really a substitute for a regular (even contract) appointment. "Does it mean that the department can recruit anyone as they wish" - yes, "and it is a mere formality to appear before the next selection committee?" - not quite. Just being around does not qualify one to appear before the selection committee - shortlisting norms have to be satisfied; and then also, the selection committee may not 'select'. This visiting faculty process as a track for regular appointment was something that was used before the contract appointment system was deviced and will probably disappear soon.

now as I mentioned, "I have 6 years of pre-PhD experience and 1 year of post PhD experience. I have got an offer of Assistant Professor at a new IIT at a basic of 30000 + 8000 AGP".

so, if I join new IIT as assistant professor at 30K+8K, after two years I will have 03 years at the level of assistant professor: will I be eligible for Associate professor? I may have to meet x publications, PhD guidance: my main concern is my pre-PhD experience of 6 years is counted to meet the min. 06 years requirement for associate, then definitely IITs are the best choice...

but, I don't know the guidelines for IIT Roorkee will be folloed at new IIts or not ??

In some IITs(IIKGP and ), they are asking 'X' years experience at level of Assistant professor at IITs, IISc Bangalore, IIMs, NITIE Mumbai and IISERs or at an equivalent level in any such other Indian or foreign institution/institutions of comparable standards as may be so decided by the Institute. But not for all institutions/organizations.

I strongly believe that this is not correct thing, but they will look above statements.

I don't thing that they will consider your experience and some time they may consider your experience if you have excellent records in terms of standards publication, R&D projects and 'Y' research students.

now, my two straigh questions are:1. If IITR gives pre-PhD exeperience due weightage, why not other IITs ?2.If they are not giving, so IIT asst. professors are again down w.r.t. NIT, for them even with 5 years of pre-PhD exper. will make them Associate.. anybody can explain why???3. Generally in Engineering streams, we go for some research/teaching job after our BTech or MTech. then with gaining good exper., we go for PhD. so the precious time, we spent before PhD can't be just ignored ..

so, please comment and let other IITs take note of these very important concerns of prosperous new IIT faculties.. they must follow IITR norms..

For example, one should have at least 6 years of teaching/research/industrial experience after obtaining Ph.D degree, out of which at least 3 years should be at level of Assistant Professor in IIT, NIT or comparable institutions including CSIR Labs and industries for Associate Professor Post in NIT Roorkela.

Professor post one should have at least 10 years of teaching/research/industrial experience, out of which at least 4 years should be at the level of Associate Professor in an IIT,NIT or comparable Institute of Higher learning or equivalent or 6 years at the level of Assistant Professor (5th CPC Rs.12,000-18,300/- scale)

Dear Varaprasad suppose somebody has quality research/teaching experience in good reasearch labs/institute after MTech. do anybody feel, that are not useful experience??PhD makes one more specific and focussed in one area.moreover, take the statistics: how many engineering graduates do PhD in continuation.. very less..In science stream generally they do in continuation..so, IITs are discouraging young engineering fellows to go for faculty job, as they will be loosing pre-PhD exper.. and will be put on APOC.. Prof Giri, Madras please give your valuable suggestions..

Dear Varprasad Engineering graduates genearally go for jobs after their BTech or MTech. which is not the case in science streams. now if engg. grads acquire good exper. in research/industry/teaching, why not to consider their work exper..what phD does: it makes you more focussed in one area..Now if you do not consider pre-PhD exper, which were considered earlier, engineering people will not be intersetd to join IITs as they will be put on APOC after PhD..they will go in industry..

Dear Varaprasad my question is not concerned with the clause:"the minimum requirement of experience may be relaxed for candidates with outstanding academic and/or research record."In IITG/NITR advert.

my concern is why not they mention like IITR that pre-PhD relevant exper. will be counted for the total exper.Even, MHRD notification dated 18.08.10, does n't say to ignore such exper..In fact, IIT are reluctant to ask clarification from MHRD on this issue.. they all fear the minister..

""Had it been the case, IIT teachers would have been picked up by the elite Stanford and Harvard universities even today. But none have gone," Sibal said at an international education seminar in New Delhi

Even the best young faculty in India like Prof. Giridhar can not get into Stanford or Harvard. Sibal, as always, is completely being stupid.

IITR is also an IIT and they have mentioned very explicitly about pre-PhD experience; as you have noted, the MHRD notification does not exclude pre-PhD experience. So, yes, pre-PhD experience will count as experience. However, there is going to be most likely a difference in publications etc between pre-PhD experience and post-PhD experience. IITM is just using the wording as it is given in the MHRD notification, but due credit is given for relevant pre-PhD experience.

Respected iitmsriram sir Thanks for replying to my queries. In fact, I do agree with you that as far as publications are concerned, one has to publish in order to support PhD work. at the same time I feel people working in good research/teaching organization where BE or MTech is required contributes a lot in the overall development to become a good faculty/researcher at IITs. well, you have told that IITM gives wordings as per MHRD notification, which is not very clear. I have personally written to the concerned IIT authorities regarding pre-PhD experience. their answer was big NO to pre-PhD exper..I have several years of pre-PhD exper., and if it is not considered at all, as they replied, I feel they are just misinterpreating the MHRD notification. I may forward those mails to MHRD.. if required.. Thanks again for your response. I request you to speak about this issue through this esteemed blog, so that IIT authorities may take note of this, because they are not going to ask for clarification to MHRD..

Do the older IITs discourage offering positions to both husband and wife in the same department? If I get an offer from an IIT, will the application of my spouse in the same department be given due consideration ?

Why older IITs, all IITs will have a slight problem with offering positions to husband and wife in the same department; it really has to do with handling the central government rules on this issue. It can be done, we do have at least one such on IITM campus, but it can be done very easily if the two are in different departments (we have several in IITM AE).

"their answer was big NO to pre-PhD exper"; contact the Registrar or Dean (Admin or Faculty Affairs) or Deputy Director DD (Faculty) who are the only ones who can answer this authoritatively. Of course, ultimately, it is left to the selection committee to decide if the experience is 'relevant'. If any Registrar / Dean / DD gave you the above NO, take it up with the Director or the Ministry; if it was an HoD (or someone similar; I suspect this to be the case), get the clarification from the Dean or DD.

sriram

ps: pl. don't 'sir' me; I have not been knighted, at least not yet :-)

Dear iitmsriram Thanks for your response. Can anyone kindly provide the link to central govt. regulations for hiring husband and wife in the same dept.? I tried searching the regulations of IIT and could not find it.

Respected Prof Sriram Thanks for your positive reply. I will forward the reply to the concerned director from where I got NO to the pre-PhD exper. In fact, they are the faculty in charge or registrar himself, who replied in Negative. well, this is convincing thet let the selection committee decide whether the pre-phD experience is relevant or equivalent, but at the time of shorlisting, you can not just ignore if some body has research/teaching/industry experience.. Thanking you againDSen

@DS : cannot speak for all the central univs., but JNU does reimburse the airfare. you have to sign a contract though agreeing to pay back the airfare reimbursed to you if you leave within 3 years. apart from the airfare, you wont get any other relocation expenses, unlike the IIX'sS

I was very interested how IISc manages to avoid mention of caste in its form when IITs/IISERs can not. IISc does mention though that "Women candidates and applicants belonging to the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes are especially encouraged to apply." This line looks good.

As I understand after reading most of the posts, the first stage of the offer is a verbal/ email and then if the candidate says yes the paper copy comes in. If its still a yes one has officially accepted the offer. Now say within a month of thatyou get a better offer, from another IIX ? Is it even possible to do that or if yes would it be ethical ? More importantly how personally do people take it or how difficult does this make life later on ?

Final question- how easy is it in India to move to another IIX later on- as in a few years?

iitsriram, varaprasad, DSen The basic norms of including Pre-PhD experience should not vary on Institute to institute. It should be as per MHRD notifications, which does not say not to include relevant Pre-PhD experience for faculty positions in IITs. IIT Roorkee has done the right thing by making it very clear. In fact, IIT Delhi has also included in their website.Other IITs are making it vague by just ignoring in their advert. They are inviting lot of RTIs for the same well, as per iitsriram, it should be decided by selection committee to give due weightage to pre-Phd experience.

In your "For prospective and new faculty at IISc" webpage, it is mentioned that "The position of Assistant Professors will be in PB-3 i.e. Rs.15,600-39,100 with minimum pay of Rs.30,000/- (called the basic)"

My question is, how is this 'basic' calculated? Or is it a number given by the pay commission for each PB window?

Another point:

I read in an advt, "Five non-compounded advance increments shall be admissible at the entry level of recruitment as Assistant Professor to persons possessing the degree of Ph.D." for a Lecturer post in a central university with the salary structure of PB:15600-39100 + AGP:6000.

Is the basic pay of this post also 30,000?

The non-compounded advance increments is calculated on BP+AGP or only on BP?

Hi,I have an offer from both IISc and an old IIT for an AP position. I am not sure which offer I should accept. Could you please advise me with the pros and cons. Thanks in advance for your valuable inputs.K.S.

Dear K.S. I have the same situation. and i am choosing old iit over iisc.well this is my personal opinion and evaluation based on which i've chosen iit. 1. i love the exuberant atmosphere in iit. it reminds me my btech days. lots of cultural extracurricular activities happen in iit campus bcoz they have plenty of btech students. you might not really join them in discotheque, but like that atm. plus tech fest/ strong gymkhana/ magazine etc etc.. i know some activities happen in iisc but no comparison to iit. again am not saying that you are gonna participate in all the events. its the atmosphere in iit which attracts me.It looks to me that in IISC people do just research, they hardly enjoy their life. days and night just research and research and research:). well most of the people do that. I have several friends in iisc both as stdnt and faculty, so info is base on their feedback. For me there is life beyond research.Here is a thought: Just think how many night-outs you had during your research in USA and ask an iisc studnt how many days S/he had.One of my friend told me that he realized how beautiful the campus is in the early morning for the first time during stay in IISc as prof. becos he went to bed almost everyday after 3 am. during his 6-7 years phd. 2. I love teaching and strongly believe on Feynmen's philosophy that teaching helps you to prosper as a scientist. IISc does have grad courses but no comparison to undergrad teaching. Imagine you are encountering with some bright and young minds which throw more questions to you. And what i got to know from my HOD of iit dept that i need to teach only one course per sem, so its not overburden to you either. Well this may be CONS for those who dont love teaching.3. Well now what i am going to tell you will raise some eyebrows for sure. Dude i have the impression based on the feedback of stdnts and young profs in IISc that during your early days in IISc as Asst. Prof senior prof. treat you as stdnt or JRF. And most of the profs have huge ego...although they are doing the same research in the last 25 yrs...and are supremely satisfied with their bhatnagar achievement and think they are the best!!they made a God and just pay homage to him everyday and happy with our nation's 9% GDP (currently 7.4%)and cant imagine in their wildest dream to make iisc like one MIT/Harvard/Stanford. Spare Dr. Madras, how many prof do care abt h-index. Now this prob is everywhere in IITs also, but as i said atleast they dont have a god and have much less hierarchy...and fortunately senior profs there dont treat you as JRF. Also i heard in IISC there are politics abt Brahmin/caste and regionalism. this is everywhere though. 4. Coons: IISc gives you higher start-up money than iisc but its merely 10-15 lacs which doesnt matter in the long run. But you can always bargain with IISC HOD to fund you for your costly equipment set-up. unfortunately IIT director/HOD dont even talk about those things. But again dont pissed off IIT. i figured out after chatting several times with you HOD, you can actually convince them to fund your expensive equipment. it is just not theor culture to discuss about those things in you interview session with director. Isn't that funny?

Let me summarize and reword what SRT is stating; if you want to do some undergraduate teaching, some grad teaching plus research, choose IIT. If you want to do mostly research and some grad teaching, choose IISc. If you dont like teaching or working with undergrads, you will be very unhappy at IIT.

And, senior profs treating freshie ass profs in 'some manner' is not peculiar to any institute - it is there in IISc, it is there in IITs. Depends mostly on the department (and the senior profs).

Start up funding may be higher in IISc, but not by much. This is something you have to work out with your HoD - not necessarily at the time of interview; just mention at that time that since you work in some blah blah area and no facilities for that are available in the department, you will need some x lakhs start up seed money. This is not going to be finalized at the interview, so just leave it at that. IITM is giving upto 30 lakhs (maybe more) if you can make a case for it. This has a separate process with proposal, presentation etc through the dean of sponsored research.

RTI or not, IITM will stick to the (minimum) wording as in the official ministry document. Whatever is put in an advertisement becomes binding on the IIT, even to the extent of taking away the 'right' of the interview / selection panel to decide what is relevant experience. For example, if someone worked in an automobile assembly line, would that be relevant experience to be a bio technology faculty member?

KS,iisc is full of nerds..freaks..dont go there...life in iisc is dull, boring, show-off workoholic (reaon why it is show-off bcoz most of the time prof/stdnts keep themselves busy with net surfing/news/blogging/facebook/orkut bla bla and show to the whole world that they are very busy.....few exceptions are there but thats very few.)iisc is full of cynic scientist!! Now look at yourself in the mirror and decide what you are...if you wanna be one of them then God bless you. or join IIT

Dear iitsriram the wordings of MHRD is not clear. why not IITs ask clearly about the 03 or 06 years exper. condition for Assistant or Associate clearly. see, if they say 03 or 06 years of research/teaching/industry exper. , it is very much clear that it need not to be post-PhD ? yes, the relevant exper. may be decided by institute shortlisting committee at the departmental and institute level. this is how IITs were doing earlier.please commentDr SKJha

Our host seems to be busy, so I will respond. That page you cite is slightly incorrect. The basic consists of two parts, a pay in pay band and a grade pay. The website is calling pay in pay band as basic which is incorrect. So, the basic pay for an assistant professor is actually 30000+8000 = 38000 basic. This is the minimum and the actual basic is left to the interview / selection committee to fix. Unless there are strong reasons (say, a paper in Nature, or 20 Journal papers from an assistant professor candidate), the committee will go by years of prior experience in fixing the basic. With 'strong' reasons as above, additional increments may be given. In the (non IIX) advertisement you quote, the minimum basic pay is 15600+6000 = 21600. Five non-compounded increments is 5*3 = 15% of basic (compounded increments would go 1.03^n, 3% being the standard increment) = 3240. So the pay structure would be pay of 15600 + 3240 = 18840 (pay in pay band) + grade pay 6000 = basic of 24840.

1. "Students work much harder than IIT that they do not see early morning." They may do so but there is no pressure to do so. People have parties and enjoy life. I often take my students out on trips and also have several parties with colleagues. Prof. Giridhar may not participate in them but all of us are not like him ;-) We all have active social lives, both when I was a student here in IISc and now as a faculty

If the research is so much more in IISc than IIT, why is the output in terms of papers comparable?

2. We do not treat young faculty like JRF. Simply not correct. It is in IITs that young faculty are required batches of 800 first year students. IISc is also starting undergrad program next year, so if you want to teach undergrads, you can but the bacthes will be around 100.

3. The startup grants vary from 25 to 30 lakhs in IISc. IISc also have provided grants of Rs. 2 crores to young faculty. If the faculty participates in interdisciplinary programs, the start up funding can be a few more crores.

BTW, I am (according to your definition), a supremely egoistic professor in IISc, who is satisfied with his Bhatnagar obtained years back and does not know his h-index

A Rebuttal to Bhatnagar recipient, supremely egoistic professor in IISc (well you had fun to my definition, didnt you?):

1. Well, my argument was the atmosphere which you want to choose as Asst. Prof in IISc or IIT. Now since the issue of student's life has been raised (by myself first), dont you guys think that we should improve their lifestyle. well Dear Professor, its really nice to know that you go for outing with your group. Firstly is it the general custom in IISc or some good people like you do that? 2ndly is it sufficient to improve the lifestyle of a stdnt. I remember, my phd advisor always told us that best solution or idea of your project are always popped up in your mind during your sky-diving!! That sounds funny, but the logic is if you keep your researchers in stress-free, joyful in the lab they will become more innovative, esp. since there is no dearth of stress or tension in our personal life. well innovation is last thing we esteemed profs in IIX probably care since we are cultured to produce a data after twisting a little to the original invention from west and then repent on some conference after 20 years (when you become distinguished) that you just missed that great invention by a nanometer...hehe.. Back to stdnt lifestyle, as i said in my previous post, just compare the number of night-outs a student generally has in USA compared to IISc. Do we, the profs really think that our stdnts have a personal life to lead. Lot of stdnts cant even get the promised stipend in time. Tell me how many phd scholars (both IISc and IIT) get married in time which is their phd days (since its a culture of 6 yrs to complete a phd!!)Anyways this is off-topic. Read my next post (as reply) in this blog about the actual rebuttal to our supremely egoistic professor in IISc.

SRT: Sitting in the US and criticizing the IISc professors calling them slave drivers, who do not allow their Ph.D students to have a social life, is PATHETIC. Let us see how you treat your Ph.D students after ten years when you are a professor. Please post the statistics of how many night outs and marriage of your Ph.D students after you are in IIT.

I think the last few comments are getting bit personal. I think whether a PhD student works late nights or during the stipulated day hours is strictly up to him. Some students prefer working late nights than getting up at 7 in the morning.As far as US and India comparison goes, even tough I don't have a statistical estimate, all PhD students in US are not married and work only during the stipulated 8 hours, even worse is that even though their contracts say that 20 hour week, most of them end up spending 50-60 hours per week in the lab. You also have equal number of working too hard to impress professors even in US that force their grad students to work like donkeys. There is a saying among academia in US that Grad students are the cheapest labor (since if you calculate- their hourly income comes down to pennies). In my opinion, I think there is no argument regarding which PhD life (India vs US) is better, since both boil down to individual professor as well as student's personal preferences.Rp

Well I started writing the reply to IISc prof's response, but had to leave since labwork came up. and here i see the response from an IIT prof to my previous post regarding stdnt's life in IIX. Now I do feel that its not too much important to respond to the IISc Prof's comment, since at the end of the day we accept the offer from IIT or IISc for Asst. Prof. position based on both professional and personal preferences. Because an IIT prof think I am pathetic as i am talking big from US regarding Stdnt'd lifestyle in India, i think this is a serious matter now and i must reply to this.Since I am going to be Asst. prof in IIT in 6 months, i doubt my opinion will change in this short period of time. So do you think I would be less PATHETIC if I would have made this comment after 6 months when i would be in India. Nice!! Why dont you guys take the criticism in a healthy manner if someone is making it from USA. Why do you think that a person in usa doesnt have any clue about the things happening in india and why do you think that you are facing more challenges or struggling more in India than a person in USA??

Well, Firstly what i told about student life in my previous post was meant for all the stdnts in IIX (X = Sc, T,..). And I did not call the IISc profs as slave drivers. If you want to label it like that then please put it on IIX (IIT and IISc) profs in general. By law i will be in that group in 6 months. And surely I will post my data after 10 years of my tenure as Asst. Prof. But what i wanted to highlight in my previous post is more serious matter than my 10 years statistics or my preference of IIT over IISc. Unless you improve the stdnt lifestyle in IIX you can not attract good stdnts in the PhD program in this highly paid Industry job scenario esp in the Engineering fields. Most of Btech stdnts will be reluctant to join your grad program unless we put a good impression of the grad stdnt's lifestyle in front of our society esp. since one can get a highly paid industry job after btech. Rather than cursing on IT boom it will be wiser thing to do if we put up a much better lifestyle of a grad stdnt in our society. I think a phd stdnt gets around 15K per month now a days and am sure that will go up over the years and its not that bad to lead a lifestyle with you hostel/meal/transportation facilities. To attract young graduates in the grad program you need to show them that they can have fun/nightlife, the weekend parties/‘active social life’ like their batchmates who are doing jobs in IT-sector.

Just an example: I asked one of my cousin why he didn’t think about joining a grad program in IISc? My cousin doing a job in B’lore in IT. He replied to me that he cant see a social life in IISc, one of his school friends are doing his grad studies in the same city and he can even enjoy the weekends since his advisor wants him to work in the wkdays. So my cousin got discouraged to do the grad studie.. And I am sure my cousin is not the only example…I am sure at some point of time in our phd we all had worked in the wkends, had night-outs. But its not the rule if you do you grad studies in USA/Europe.. Grad stdnt leads a life there..

It may not be directly relevant to the main topic of this post but I agree with one point of SRT.

"Why do you think that a person in usa doesnt have any clue about the things happening in india?"

Instead of engaging in the constructive discussion, it is common among lot of Indians to fall back on two arguments:

1. It is so easy to comment about India sitting in USA.

2. Harping on great Indian culture as against western culture.

There are good and bad things in both countries and in both cultures. It is up to an individual to pick good ones from both countries and cultures.

The choice of joining IIT vs. IISc is personal. Both have their pros and cons. How much social life one needs is also a personal choice? I am aware of students who had all fun in IISc and no fun in IIT and other way round too.

I am a senior PhD student in a reputed university in USA and here is my personal opinion: Good science and plush "lifestyle" does not go hand in hand at least in PhD days. No one can attract someone into science by the bait of a "lifestyle", good or great. He/She must get into it by his/her own urge. That is the story in the US as well more so I believe. Quality and dedicated researchers, be it grad students, post docs, asst profs , DO NOT LEAD A "LIFE" there . I am not saying money is not important in the life of a scientist, of course it is, and the scientists and professors sould be paid much more handsomely for their service to the nation is profound. But you cant attract someone into science by this reward as the source of gratification is laid somewhere else. The person who goes into Wall street has a different aim in life than who is choosing to do a PhD and choose a science carrer. By improving lifestyle you can attract numbers of average quality, but to do good and great science which I believe is most important for India, something else is necessary, something more fundamental.

I did my phd from ivy league univ in usa, currently doing my postdoc in USA and dont know if i will join an IIT or IISc. Here is my 50 cents on the above discussion: A grad student/post doc or an Asst. Professor who gets fun in doing beautiful and high quality research doesn't lead a life like a banker/IT-person or a CEO. I think the meaning of life changes when you go through a phd program. A good scientist enjoys his/her little little breakthrough in research more than anything else in this world.However you are always under pressure of deadlines. Things become worst if your project is industry-sponsored because if you can not deliver they will terminate your funding in the next quarter/semester or next year. Having said that people still enjoy their life here, have their share of fun/parties in phd days. It depends on the individuals. I think guys here manage their time very well to lead a good social life beyond the laboratory. However there are some guys who sucked up in the lab day & night, always complain about their pressure from advisor. From my personal observation, those are mostly Indians and chinese. But thats nothing wrong as long as one get fun in life. I think the bottomline is that you need to know how to keep yourself happy. I have seen researchers here celebrate every small success, advisor congratulates you every small step you attained in research. Thats very important i guess. I think that is fun in research if you celebrate each others small success each day in you research group with a glass of beer (can be coke or H2O though). It doesnt matter whether you are in usa or in india.I am not fully agree with SRT, but he raised an important issue. I think treatment of a phd student is different in india compared to States. I dont have statistics, but its the common impression among desis that Indian or chinese Profs always keep their grad stdnts under pressure. So i guess it all depends on lot of parameters whether you will have fun-time in your phd days or not.

Also its undeniable that a grad stdnt in USA gets better facilities like driving an used car/traveling places/buying latest iphone or laptops but that is something related to dollars earning. But what is more striking is the treatment of phd students in India by their professors/ advisors. -Prasanth

Prasanth writes "undeniable that a grad stdnt in USA gets better facilities like driving an used car/traveling places/buying latest iphone or laptops but that is something related to dollars earning." Of course, this has nothing to do with prospective faculty, but what the heck. I am not convinced about the undeniability. Standard IIX government scholarship is about 15k/month for PhD students. I believe that compares quite favourably with typical US GRA/GTA. In India also, one can buy a used car (M800) with 3-4 months' scholarship. In fact, considering cost of living, the disposable income for Indian grad students may be about as good as in the US. And, grad students who get supported directly on sponsored projects get 5-10k more than the standard scholarship ...

Rajesh: I have been very busy. Each person’s perception and conception of enjoyment varies. I do not attend parties, which involve drinking or small talk or networking or food. Some people may derive enjoyment from this, movies or so on. I derive happiness from research and philosophy. In fact, I feel that I am much much more happier than anyone else that I have met. Just because I have no social life defined by your standards, it does not mean that I am unhappy. Also, I do not force (or even suggest) anyone (including my students) to lead the life that I do.

I would never even suggest that my students work all the time but I also retain the right that I can work during weekdays and weekends.

Regarding the questions asked, I think iitmsriram has answered all the questions better than I can.

Regarding disposable income, however, I feel that it is higher if you a grad student in USA. Current grad students in USA get around $1400 or so and can around $600 if you stay in the right city. In India, you can save around $200. But lifestyles are different. In USA, you need to do your own cooking, laundry etc. In USA, you *need* an used car. In India, you eat in the mess or hire an auto.

Regarding the comment, "but its the common impression among desis that Indian or chinese Profs always keep their grad stdnts under pressure."I would probably agree to this statement if this was in the US. Especially non-tenured indian and chinese faculty are under tremendous pressure and that translates to pressure for graduate students to perform. This is because their career partly depends on the student's performance.

However, this is certainly incorrect in case of India. There is no great pressure to perform. You will not earn significantly more by performing well. In fact, *some* graduate students in IISc/IIT tell me that they are unable to perform well because their advisor does not put *any* pressure or deadlines on them or worries about their progress. They tend to relax for 2-3 years and then it is too late.

1. Is it not natural for students to be under pressure if their advisor works more than them (specially weekends and nights)?

2. If advisor works so hard in weekends/nights and students are not seen in the lab during those odd hours then advisor "may" develop a thinking that his/her students have a low productivity and are not working hard enough.

Both feelings could create a gap between the advisor and his/her student.

With your exceptional productivity, have you experienced anything similar?

I am aware that answer could vary from person to person but would love to know your experience, if you could share.

TA: I work from home during nights and on Sunday, so I have no idea (and do not want to know) whether my students are in the lab during this time. Even during working hours, I never "check" whether my students are there in the lab or not. It is their thesis and they will work appropriately. My only job is that I am available to them all the time at *their* request and convenience and I correct/discuss their work in reasonable time.

Regarding productivity, it is entirely due to students and not due to me. Most of my students are brighter and more intelligent than me (that's NOT a problem) and work harder than me and the entire credit goes to them and not to me. It is probably that I do not come in their way of productivity !

Dear Prof. TA; you ask “Is it not natural for students to be under pressure if their advisor works more than them (specially weekends and nights)? “

Being a former student of Prof. Madras, I can safely say most of the students never felt any extra pressure. Prof. Madras would be in the office really early and would work late in the evening… no doubt we use to work late night and, it used to be fun working together. It has been 7-8 years and those two years in Chemeng@iisc were the most enjoyable one…

"It is nice to have such students. Though it is also true not all students are alike and some will definitely work under pressure instead of choice. But that's OK."

We can not force the professor to change his lifestyle. Being a former student of IISc (but not of Prof. Madras), I used to be envious of his students. The manuscripts, reports, thesis, questions of his students were corrected and cleared in hours while mine took months.

Rather than being ignored, it is better to be under pressure and complete the learning and degree early.

Dear SD, regarding your query on May 23, 2010: "Do the older IITs discourage offering positions to both husband and wife in the same department? If I get an offer from an IIT, will the application of my spouse in the same department be given due consideration?"

Reply: Yes, BOTH husband and wife can get offers for suitable faculty positions in the SAME department in any IITs. There are "not so less" examples already available. IITK-Civil, IITB-Chemistry, IITG-Civil, IITB-Computer Science and few more are already available examples. So what finally matters for selection at IIT is a strong CV, not personal relations etc.:-) Hope it helps you to plan for your application.:-)DC.

V:I also had applied in IIT K six months ago. I wrote to the HOD last month to know the status and he said the shortlisting process of the applications was still on.Does anyone has any idea what's going on there? It's more than six months now since the last date of application submission.A.

Reply to above two comments dated June 11, 2010:No, it's not at all 'easy' to lead "retired life" after joining any IITs/IISc. More so for Assistant and Associate professors atleast. Every departments mostly provide some guidelines about minimum publications, see IISc web page, it says 'mostly about 2/3 journal papers every year on average' is required to get promoted in general 6 years interval in IISc. For IITs also similar norms are there. Get those information personally or using RTI. Many of the full professors cannot lead 'retired life' as by that time they got mostly used to get a nice flavour of 'research output' and it's difficult for a person to discontinue the 'love and passion of doing good research' whoever got the flavour of it. Look at the webpage of prof. giridhar and many others which can give you the answer that theoretical assumptions like 'leading retired life in IITs/IISc' are NOT the real fact.DC.

Thanks for your comments. I had visited IISc for a faculty position last month. Similar to the previous anon comment, I was told that more than 50% of the new faculty publish less than 1 paper per year on an average and teach only 1 course per year. When I mentioned that assistant professors require 2-3 papers a year (according to the blog), they told me nearly 50% of the faculty are not promoted at the end of six years but take 10 years or so to reach 10 or 15 papers and then only they are promoted.

Apparently, there is no real monetary benefit in getting promoted and many faculty do not care. I looked at the webpages of aerospace and civil engineering and the above statements seem to be correct with nearly 50% of faculty getting promoted after 8-10 years.

What you say is correct and it applies in all IITs also, even though the promotion requirements in IITs is lesser than IISc. This is because there is no carrot or stick to perform or not to perform.

However, look at faculty in NITs and other places, there is no research in these places either.

Prof. Giridhar has written extensively on this concept before and that only 20% of any faculty in any IIT/IISc are really active and contribute to 80% of the research output in terms of publications and patents. Why should the ratio among young faculty be significantly different?

Dear Professor,This is Ananth from Texas. I have received two offers from IIT Madras, one for Electrical Engineering and another for Physics. Both the offers are for position of Assistant Professor (On Contract for 2 years). Since I am a fresh graduate and did not attend the personal interview, I think this is reasonable. However, I would like to know if the IIT M people made a very clever offer for 2 years, since I need 3 years of post phd experience to be on permanent position as Assistant Professor and move to pay band 4. I am very eager to join the department of EE, however, I am confused what this Assistant Professor on Contract for 2 years is all about. Are people being offered such positions? Can I even apply for grants? Can I guide students for M.Tech and Ph.D? Are there people in the past who have been appointed on contract and regularized?I am very confused since I have received a Scientist position from Cree Inc., in North Carolina (starting July 1), however, I dont like the place as much as I would love to teach at IIT-M.Could anybody throw any inputs?

AssProf on contract is entitled to all privileges of regular AssProf. Does your appointment order (not the cover letter, the next page) say grade pay of 7000? (I guess it should). If so, you are getting one years' experience credit and in 2 years, you will be moved to pay of 30K+8K grade pay as regular AssProf (and hence the two year contract); it will take a further 3 years to move to PB4. Contract positions have always been available in the IITs (its there in the original statutues), but have been used only occasionally. With the 6th Pay Commission, contract appointments has become standard mode of operation. All applicants with less than 3 years experience, whether they appear in person in the interview or not, are to be offered contract appointments only till they obtain this level of experience (except for really exceptional candidates).

How strict are the IITs/IISc in imposing the "preferably below 35 years old" rule when hiring at the Assistant Professor level? Are candidates ever rejected because they are older (say, 36 yrs) when they send their application? Thanks in advance. -A

It is only "preferably below", so it is not a strictly enforceable rule. However, unless there is some good reason why a candidate is applying for the entry level post of AssProf while being over this age limit, the application is liable to be rejected. To give a more concrete example, candidate A worked in an industry for ten years, decided to go back to school and do a PhD and soon after, applies for AssProf at an IIT. Candidate B did PhD right after UG degree, worked in an industry for ten years after that and one fine day decided to quit the job and apply for PhD. Candidate A is likely to get the "preferably below 35 years" waived whereas candidate B is unlikely to get it waived. Of course, these waivers are done at the department level and then propagated on to the administration, so not all departments at all IIT may go this way.

Thanks Prof. Sriram . I have made the decision to join EE-Dept at IIT-M. I wish to say that this blog has been very useful for me to choose IIT over other positions in US. Thanks Prof. Giri for maintaining this blog.I also liked the new faculty survival guide by Prof. Sriram.

I saw several posts regarding the recruitment process at IITs. For the benefit of aspiring candidates, I am posting my experience.

How I applied and at what timelines, next stages happened

I prepared a comprehensive CV, teaching statement and philosophy. I wrote a one page research motivation document and another 3 page proposal for 3 year work to help me for start up funds.

Following the advertisement on the website, I applied on January 29 2010 for Assistant Professor in Electrical Engineering and in Physics. (Hard copy sent to the registrar, HOD of both departments).

Around Mid Feb, I called both HoDs to confirm receipt of my application.

Around mid March, I called EE dept to know if I was shortlisted, and I got yes for answer. Shortly, the HoD requested my advisors for recommendation letters.

1st week of April, I received the email asking me to appear for faculty candidate presentation and face to face interview on May 10th and May 11th for EE (May 3 and 4 for Phys).

I responded asking for in-absentia consideration. They promptly responded Yes.

On May 4 and May 11, IIT-M director called me on phone, talked to me briefly and then there were 2 external referees from IIT-D , who questioned in depth about my background, research and teaching.

On June 07, 2010, I received the appointment order for both departments by email. I sent the confirmation to EE dept that I am joining.

Hope other candidates can get a feeling for timelines when they apply in future.

Overall, it was a pleasure. Hope I can contribute more to the faculty survival guide.

Dear iitmsriram candidate A with 10 pre-PhD exper. and B with 10 years post PhD are treated same ??? may be their publications are different, but there is no logic to treat them differently. so, the pre-PhD exper. should be taken into account for faculty recritment at any level in IITs/IISc

Would anybody like to comment on the pros and cons of CSIR lab scientists positions and IIX faculty positions. It seems to me that IIX salary's are more but other than that any comparisons with respect to service conditions, grants etc ?

First time visited your site and blog. Looks very good. However, I have not seen a discussion as to whether one would prefer IIT over a top tier US university for doing research. What is the view on this?

I am interested in academics field, but currently working in engineering services for a IT company.I have completed my BE in 2007,wrote GATE in 2010,just qualified. Cannot get a seat in IIT. Should I spend another year preparing for GATE or shall I join NIT's? If I join a NIT and later do a PHd from IIT,can I join as a faculty in IIT?am i eligible????

About Me

I am a professor in Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore.
I work in the chemical engineering department and I am an associate faculty in Solid State and Structural Chemistry Unit (SSCU),
My interest is primarily research, which I try to perform without any diversions.
I believe in working with passion in whatever we do, however "small" the work may seem to others.
I named this blog "Life in IISc" because I spend all my time in IISc. If I am in Bangalore, I am in IISc, nowhere else!

The views expressed here are my personal opinions and certainly not that of IISc.